Joe Hockey used the leaked emails from John McTernan to mock Labor during Question Time.

ABC News

The Federal Government has seized on emails leaked to the ABC that expose the tactics of one Julia Gillard's most controversial media advisers, John McTernan.

The emails include Labor's budget messaging for 2012 when the former Government was projecting a budget surplus, which it never achieved.

Treasurer Joe Hockey told Question Time the emails and their contents expose how hollow Labor's repeated promises and declarations of reaching a surplus were.

"I picked up on this stray email from a Mr John McTernan. Remember him? We do," Mr Hockey said.

"And it's an email to chiefs of staff and media advisers and it goes like this: 'We know from the groups that voters see surpluses as an emblem of good economic management.'

"Well we agree, we were the last party to deliver a surplus."

Liberal MPs including the Prime Minster laughed when Mr Hockey quoted the email instructing Cabinet ministers to declare Labor had delivered a surplus, despite the former government never achieving its fiscal targets.

"Labor's words, they all came from the spinmeister based on groups," Mr Hockey said.

"Next Tuesday at the National Press Club we're going to deliver a budget update based on the facts, it will tell the truth... which Labor never did."

'Are we opposed to the Madigan Bill?'

The emails also show the adviser was clueless about whether Labor opposed a bill to restrict abortion access despite being credited with crafting Ms Gillard's misogyny speech and gender strategies.

The day after Ms Gillard delivered her "Women for Gillard" speech, which warned of Liberal men wearing blue ties wanting to make abortion their plaything, Mr McTernan emailed junior staff asking: "Are we opposed to the Madigan Bill on abortion?"

"Yes, wholeheartedly [opposed]," replied a colleague.

The bill, proposed by Victorian Democratic Labor Party Senator John Madigan, would have removed Medicare funding for women having abortions due to their foetus's gender.

Mr McTernan was a divisive figure within the Gillard government and is credited with driving political strategies that the Coalition described as stoking a "gender war".